“If your sex life is suffering, take a hard look at the other aspects of your relationship because the culprit is likely not sex.”

If sex is no big deal inside a relationship, then how can sex outside of it be a big deal? Alan says that there are many other motivators and drivers in a relationship than sex, and if there are problems in the relationship bed, there is likely something else causing it.

Alan said:

The author makes the very valid point that sex is not the only driver of a relationship, that there are many, many other things that keep relationships together, and many other ways to have intimacy. He’s also speaking from the monagmy model, which dosen’t work for every person either.

But I’ll say this: in many situations where the sex life is going downhill, it is the symptom, not the cause of the relationship suffering. To put it bluntly, if your sex life is suffering, you’d better look really hard at every other aspect of your relationship, and see what isn’t working, because it’s probably not the sex that’s the culprit.

wellokaythen responded:

That’s a very good point. Just because sex can be a very important part of life doesn’t mean it’s independent of other things, and the quality of a sex life is highly dependent on the larger relationship.

I can find some little piece of wisdom in the article if I look at it that way. Look at and improve other parts of one’s relationship and the sex life will likely get better. No guarantees on that, but a declining sex life in a relationship is not automatically irreversible. I can attest to that personally. And, having *some* sexual incompatibility is not the end of the world either.

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